Timely. Relevant.
Resonant.
These are the promotional
watchwords for must-see TV and movies in our politics-saturated pop culture today.
The New York Times recently published
a piece about the “timeliness” of the new Amazon series American Gods,
because of the show’s pro-immigration theme. The Times also advertised
Hulu’s adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale
as “newly resonant,” because of the widespread, unhinged fretting that
President Trump is going to usher in a misogynistic theocracy in which women are
stripped of their rights and reduced to being childbearing livestock.
There is more. Director
Ron Howard revealed
that a Nazi character in his Nat Geo series Genius
was modeled after President Trump, and that an episode with an immigration
theme had “vital resonance” with current events. The alt-history Amazon series The
Man in the High Castle is seen as relevant because of the absurd fear-mongering
over imaginary, “deeply disturbing
parallels” between the Trump administration and the show’s depiction of
a fascist America. Not even kids’ movies can escape this hysteria: analogies are
actually being
drawn between Trump and the titular character from the animated film The Boss Baby.
The list of
examples could go on and on, but while the trend seems ubiquitous, it did not
begin with the rise of Trump. Hyping the topical nature of a book, movie, or TV
series is a common, longstanding promotional strategy, particularly if the
story being advertised also promotes a particular political agenda. Every story
that can be politically weaponized is marketed breathlessly as “timely.”
Though a connection
to current events may draw us in on one level, it is a very limiting and
unfulfilling way of appreciating story. Reducing a tale to its political
relevance immediately divides viewers and precludes our appreciation for any
other perspective on a story – namely, seeing the more enduring human values in it that unite us. Yes, exploiting
political controversy sells, but politicizing a movie or TV show or song or
painting or sculpture or dance or any other art form in this way is rarely
enlightening; on the contrary, it is inevitably divisive, not to mention
usually inartful. It changes few if any minds; instead, it largely preaches to
the choir and hardens resistance among the unconverted, leaving little
flexibility for viewers to question themselves and be seduced by other
possibilities. It stirs no emotions except self-righteousness on one side of
the political aisle and outrage on the other.
Worst of all, there
is no transcendence in such storytelling, because politics is not a realm of
the spirit. Politics is grounded in the struggle for temporal power. While it
provides endless possibilities for plots both tragic and comic, the political
element alone cannot provide us with that emotional catharsis Aristotle saw as the
key to great storytelling. This is not to say that stories with political settings
cannot move us, or be spiritually or morally elevating, or contain deeper
themes and meaning. The problem comes when we view it through the narrow lens
of the political “timeliness” of any given story. Robert Penn Warren’s
political novel All the King’s Men is
a classic not because critics of Donald Trump might find some timely parallel
between him and the novel’s protagonist Willy Stark that confirms their opinion
of Trump, but because the book addresses themes of sin and corruption (among
others) which connect us all (indeed, Warren has said that All the King’s Men was never intended to be a book about politics).
To rise above the
petty, transitory conflicts of politics, look beyond the timeliness of a story to its timelessness.
Seek out tales that speak not to the specifics of our moment, but that put a
spotlight on our common humanity (or inhumanity, as the case may be). Look for
classics, like All the King’s Men,
that have stood the test of time. From Aeschylus to Zola, these are stories
that still touch our souls not because we can superimpose today’s headlines on them
but because they address eternal themes about the human condition; not because
they confirm our self-righteous political biases but because they humble us and
leave us wiser.
From Acculturated, 5/7/17
